Beginning about 540 million years ago, the first of many shallow inland seas ushered in the Paleozoic and later the Mesozoic eras.

Shallow ocean waters covered a significant part of the interior of North America, including the region we recognize as the Great Plains. —Encyclopedia of the Great Plains

I feel a certain soul-settling when experiencing the wonders of the PRAIRIE and the SEA. I’ve been exploring why I am so drawn to wide-open landscapes.

My ancestors left Europe, landed on the eastern shores of North America, and headed west, eventually settling on the plains of southern South Dakota. I moved in a reversed migratory pattern—leaving the plains and settling in New England after living and working in New Zealand, Australia, Tennessee, and Montana.

I think my inherent nature, choices, circumstances, travel, and understanding all have played roles in why certain landscapes speak to me so profoundly. My native Nebraska friend, artist Elizabeth Bunsen and I refer to this as our interior geography. LINK: elizabeth bunsen’s instagram

I will forever be gnawing on the bone of my genetic inheritance and wondering if my ancestors also needed a lot of space to feel settled within themselves.

Pick a theme and work it to exhaustion…the subject must be something you truly love or truly hate.

—Dorthea Lange, photographer/journalist/my hero